Air Force leaders are planning to
offer bonuses, fill gaps in the supervisory ranks, offer a nuclear service medal
and put more money into modernizing what in some respects has become a decrepit
Minuteman 3 missile force that few airmen want to join.

The potential impact
of these and other planned changes is unclear. They do not appear to address
comprehensively what some see as the core issue: a flagging sense of purpose in a
force that atrophied after the Cold War ended two decades ago as the military's
focus turned to countering terrorism and other threats.

Even so, some
analysts are encouraged by these initial Air Force moves.

"I think this is a
step in the right direction," said Dana Struckman, a retired Air Force officer who
commanded a Minuteman 3 missile squadron at Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota
in 2003-05. "I think it will make a difference."

Driving this effort is Air
Force Secretary Deborah Lee James, who took over as the service's top civilian
official in December amid a series of embarrassing lapses by the men and women who
operate, support and lead the fleet of 450 intercontinental ballistic missiles
based in North Dakota, Montana and Wyoming.

The missiles are armed with
nuclear warheads, ready for launch on short notice any day, any hour.

In
January, after visiting a Minuteman 3 base, Hagel declared, "We know that
something is wrong." He ordered a pair of comprehensive reviews to identify what
was amiss and to recommend solutions. Both reviews missed their initial deadlines
for completion, and Hagel has said little publicly about it in recent months.

The cascade of bad news began in May 2013 when The Associated Press revealed
that a group of ICBM launch officers at Minot Air Force Base had been stripped of
their authority following a poor inspection result and other problems. The AP also
disclosed that the deputy operations commander at Minot had complained in an
internal email of "rot" in his ranks -- an assessment that aired a range of morale
and other behavioral, training, leadership and security problems that later
emerged at the ICBM bases in Wyoming and Montana.

In October the two-star
general in charge of ICBMs was fired for drunken behavior while on official
business in Russia, and in November the AP revealed an unpublished study that
found evidence of "burnout" among missile launch officers and cited elevated rates
of personal misconduct within the ICBM force.

For months Air Force officials
insisted that the morale issues and other problems amounted to nothing more than
commonplace gripes and isolated, correctable goofs. James, however, took a
different approach.

In January, just weeks after taking office and days
after the discovery of an exam-cheating scandal among nearly 100 launch crew
members in the 341st Missile Wing at Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana, James
declared herself "profoundly disappointed" and announced that the ICBM force was
in need of closer scrutiny. She visited all three ICBM bases and said afterward
the problems were "systemic," not isolated.

Also in January, the
Air Force disclosed that three ICBM launch officers were among those implicated in
a criminal investigation of drug use or possession -- a probe that remains active.

Since then the Air Force has developed and begun publicizing internal
changes aimed at fixing what ails the ICBM force, although the two reviews that
Hagel ordered in February are not yet complete. It's unclear how the Air Force's
proposed changes will be squared with whatever recommendations emerge from Hagel's
reviews.

Among the potentially important moves, James has recommended to
Hagel that he put a four-star general in charge of the nuclear Air Force,
including the ICBM and bomber fleets, thereby elevating its status and clout
inside an Air Force more focused on air, space and cyberspace missions. A three-
star general currently is running the force. Raising the rank to four stars will
require approval by Congress.

Such a move would put the Air Force more in
line with the Navy, where a four-star officer, Adm. Terry J. Benedict, oversees
its nuclear force.